By Ankit Panda
The IAEA’s final assessment of the possible military dimensions of Iran’s nuclear program is revealing.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released a highly anticipated report today on Iran’s nuclear program. The report, entitled “Final Assessment on Past and Present Outstanding Issues regarding Iran’s Nuclear Programme,” is available here (PDF). Critically, the report offers the IAEA’s final assessment on the so-called possible military dimensions (PMD) of Iran’s civil nuclear program.
The PMD issue had been a core sticking point between Iran and international negotiators leading up to the July 14, 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The JCPOA, known more commonly as the “Iran nuclear deal,” set out a multi-decade plan to restrict Iran’s civil nuclear program in exchange for Tehran receiving relief from United Nations, United States, and European Union economic sanctions (you can read more about the specifics of the deal here). The IAEA’s final assessment and investigation of PMD are part of a July 14, 2015 agreement in parallel to the JCPOA.
The IAEA’s latest report is sure to spark discussion on Iran’s nuclear program. Indeed, Robert Einhorn’s prediction in the National Interest, ahead of the report’s release, is prescient: “The outcome will almost surely be messy and inconclusive, not pleasing to any of the parties concerned.” (Einhorn’s full article is excellent background on the salience of the PMD question for the Iran deal.) I haven’t made it through the report in full just yet, but a glance at the world of Iran observers on Twitter shows that there is plenty in this report to satisfy the confirmation biases of analysts both for and against the nuclear deal.
Read the full story at The Diplomat